The application of prostate specific membrane antigen in CART‑cell therapy for treatment of prostate carcinoma (Review).

Abstract

Adoptive cell transfer (ACT) is an emerging immunotherapy technique that restricts tumor growth and invasion in cancer patients. Among the different types of ACT, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)T‑cell therapy is considered to be the most advanced and a potentially powerful technique for the treatment of cancer in clinical trials. The primary aim of CART‑cell therapy is to destroy cancer cells and therefore, it serves an important role in tumor immunotherapy. CART‑cell therapy has been demonstrated to mainly treat blood cancer by targeting cluster of differentiation (CD)‑19, CD20, CD22, CD33 and CD123. However, the use of CART‑cell therapy for treating solid tumors is currently under extensive investigation. With respect to prostate cancer, prostatic acid phosphatase, prostate‑specific antigen, prostate‑specific membrane antigen (PSMA), prostate stem cell antigen, T‑cell receptorγ alternate reading frame protein, transient receptor potential‑p8 and six‑transmembrane epithelial antigen of the prostate 1 are among the identified target antigens for prostate tumors. However, mesothelin, fibroblast activation protein, epidermal growth factor receptor, carcinoembryonic antigen, disialoganglioside‑2 and human epidermal growth factor 2 are among the main targets of CART‑cell therapy in the case of other types of solid tumors. The main challenges in CART‑cell therapy are the selection of the target antigens and the modulation of the ideal tumor microenvironment for T‑cells to fight against the cancer. The present review focuses on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th generations of anti‑PSMA CARs and their application for combating prostate carcinoma.